In one embodiment, a network device includes an interface configured to receive a data packet including a header section, at least one parser to parse the data of the header section yielding a first header portion and a second header portion, a packet processing engine to fetch a first match-and-action table, match a first index having a corresponding first steering action entry in the first match-and-action table responsively to the first header portion, compute a cumulative lookup value based on the first header portion and the second header portion responsively to the first steering action entry, fetch a second match-and-action table responsively to the first steering action entry, match a second index having a corresponding second steering action entry in the second match-and-action table responsively to the cumulative lookup value, and steering the packet responsively to the second steering action entry.

Methods and systems for load balancing of payment requests among payment gateways by an e-commerce platform. The method may include detecting an anticipated load event and identifying a first payment gateway to be impacted by the anticipated load event, wherein a merchant account is associated with the first payment gateway. The platform may then identify, based on merchant parameters associated with the merchant account, a second payment gateway and, during the anticipated load event, transmit at least some payment requests first to the second payment gateway instead of to the first payment gateway.

An enterprise backend system may have inherent limits on a throughput of inbound messages. In one implementation, a message producer publishes messages to a message broker at a high throughput. A message consumer receives messages from the broker and throttles the throughput of messages shipped to an enterprise backend system.

A network configuration method includes determining an end-to-end latency upper bound of data traffic between two end nodes, determining an end-to-end latency constraint of the data traffic between the two end nodes, determining, based on the end-to-end latency upper bound and the end-to-end latency constraint, for a first network shaper, at least one configuration parameter that satisfies the end-to-end latency constraint, and configuring the first network shaper for the data traffic based on the at least one configuration parameter such that the traffic after being shaped by the shaper satisfies the network latency constraint.

Described embodiments include a system that includes a network interface and a processor. The processor is configured to identify, via the network interface, a state of congestion in a communication channel between a base station belonging to a cellular network and a client device, to calculate, responsively to the state of congestion, a maximum sustainable encoding bit rate (MSEBR) for a video that is being downloaded by the client device, from a server, via the communication channel, the video being encoded at a plurality of different predefined bit rates, and to inhibit the client device, in response to calculating the MSEBR, from downloading a segment of the video that is encoded at any one of the predefined bit rates that exceeds the MSEBR. Other embodiments are also described.

This application relates to the field of communications technologies, and discloses a service forwarding method and a network device that performs such method. The method includes: forwarding, by a first network device, a data packet of a first service to a second network device in a period (T.sub.1); and if the data volume of the forwarded first service reaches a threshold, forwarding, by the first network device, a data packet of a second service to the second network device. The first service is a low-latency service, and the second service is a non-low-latency service. In addition, the period (T.sub.1) is determined based on a delay allowed by a device for forwarding the data packet of the first service, and the threshold is a value determined based on a maximum transmission rate of the first service.

Disclosed is a communication network having at least one network access segment including one or more network access points, wherein a selective packet bridge appliance integral or otherwise functionally associated with the at least one network access segment, is adapted to selectively shunt packet flow between two or more mobile communication devices communicatively coupled to the at least one network access segment through access points of the at least one network segment, and wherein a packet is selected for shunting at least partially based on an intended destination of the packet and at least partially based on a payload type of the packets.

Embodiments provide techniques for device-level traffic shaping in a communications network. Embodiments operate in communication networks providing connectivity to large numbers of user-side network nodes via shared communications links. For example, customer premises equipment (CPE) devices behind one of the user-side network nodes are classified into device types according to a predetermined rate-relevant characteristic of the CPE device. Upon receiving a forward-link (FL) traffic flow destined for one of the CPE devices, the device type of the CPE device is identified, and the FL traffic flow is shaped in accordance with a traffic shaping policy that corresponds to CPE device type. Various embodiments are tailored to support architectures having device-level shapers and/or network address translators (NAT) in user-side network nodes and/or in a provider-side network node.

To provide secure communication over end-to-end data paths or segments of end-to-end paths in a timed deterministic packet network including a plurality of packet engines that perform packet handling, cipher engines are provided separately from the packet engines. The cipher engines are operative to perform at least one cyber security function. A cipher engine and key manager provides central control for the plurality of cipher engines. A centralized packet flow path manager, PFPM, may set up endpoint nodes and intermediate transit nodes of the end-to-end data paths of the packet network.

A packet network includes packet engines that perform packet handling. Cipher engines are provided separately from the packet engines for encryption and/or authentication operations. To preserve relative timing and ordering of data packets, a packet engine performs pre-shaping of data traffic, wherein the packet engine inserts dummy packets into a data flow. The packet engine provides the pre-shaped data traffic to a cipher engine.